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How many people across the globe died from COVID-19 vaccines? What did you hear from your friends about dying from the vaccine? How about partisan media channels? Or did you get some hard numbers from your social media feeds?

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Health officials on Tuesday encouraged Vermonters to get COVID-19 booster shots right up through Wednesday to protect themselves and others as they travel and visit friends and family for the Thanksgiving holiday. Testing for the virus is also recommended, Health Commissioner Mark Levine sai…

MONTPELIER — To relieve some of the pressure on Vermont hospitals caused by a combination of factors, including COVID-19, the state is opening 80 beds at long-term care and rehabilitation facilities, said Agency of Human Services Secretary Mike Smith.

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Gov. Phil Scott announced Tuesday that the state is developing a strategy to get at-home COVID-19 test kits into the hands of Vermont parents to enable them to test their children before the start of school after the break in the coming weeks, and to continue at-home testing during the acade…

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BURLINGTON — Citing her past Washington experience and commitment to Vermonters, Lt. Gov. Molly Gray jumped into the race for Congress on Monday, saying she’s ready to “fight like hell for Vermont.”

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Health officials on Tuesday encouraged Vermonters to get COVID-19 booster shots right up through Wednesday to protect themselves and others as they travel and visit friends and family for the Thanksgiving holiday. Testing for the virus is also recommended, Health Commissioner Mark Levine sai…

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MONTPELIER — Vermont is leading the country in several COVID-19 vaccination benchmarks from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including the percentage of population fully vaccinated overall, and fully vaccinated as newly eligible 5- to 11-year-olds and for most residents who ha…

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BENNINGTON — Vermont health officials joined national experts Wednesday in voicing concern about the record number of Vermonters and Americans dying from drug overdoses this year, citing increased availability of the deadly synthetic opioid fentanyl, and increased isolation and depression cr…

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MONTPELIER — With higher COVID-19 case counts in recent weeks and the holidays on the way, Gov. Phil Scott on Tuesday repeated a refrain heard at many of his news conferences since the start of the pandemic. He encouraged people to wear masks indoors, test for the virus, think about the size…

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MONTPELIER — With COVID-19 numbers declining in Vermont and nationally, booster shots being administered for all three vaccines against the virus, and younger children expected to become eligible for shots soon, Gov. Phil Scott sees no reason to reimpose a state of emergency. That announceme…

MONTPELIER — To relieve some of the pressure on Vermont hospitals caused by a combination of factors, including COVID-19, the state is opening 80 beds at long-term care and rehabilitation facilities, said Agency of Human Services Secretary Mike Smith.

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A surge driven by the delta variant is receding in the United States, but officials and experts say that increased transmission during the coming colder months remains a threat and that steady rates of vaccination are key to keeping the coronavirus at bay.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that about 56% of the U.S. population was fully vaccinated. Providers are administering an average of about 949,000 doses per day, including first, second and additional doses, far below the April peak but higher than the recent Sept. 28 low point of about 625,000, according to a New York Times database.

Surveys from the Kaiser Family Foundation show that vaccine support has been rising out of fear of the delta variant: Almost 40% of newly inoculated respondents said they had sought the vaccines because of the rise in cases, and more than a third said they had become alarmed by overcrowding in local hospitals and rising death rates.

The number of people eligible for vaccinations could also soon increase substantially: Pfizer and BioNTech asked federal regulators Thursday to authorize emergency use of their coronavirus vaccine for children ages 5 to 11, a move that could help protect more than 28 million people in the United States.

The companies say they are submitting data supporting the change to the Food and Drug Administration. The agency has promised to move quickly on the request and has tentatively scheduled a meeting Oct. 26 to consider it. An FDA ruling is expected as early as the end of this month.

Rupali Limaye, a behavior scientist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who studies vaccine hesitancy, said that parents’ getting their children aged 5 to 11 vaccinated would be a “huge game changer” because they represent a large proportion of population.

Vaccine mandates have also been taking effect recently, with federal workers and contractors, teachers, health care providers and others compelled to get immunized or risk losing their jobs. Such a requirement for New York teachers spurred thousands of last-minute vaccinations. Tyson Foods reported a 91% vaccination rate ahead of a November deadline, compared with less than half before its mandate was announced in August.

President Joe Biden appealed Thursday for more companies to mandate COVID vaccinations for employees, asking them to take initiative because an effort that he announced last month to require 80 million American workers to get the shot undergoes a rule-making process and may not go into effect for weeks.

A report released by the White House on Thursday sought to show how vaccine mandates had helped persuade more people to receive their shots: Seventy-eight percent of eligible adults have had at least a first dose.

As the country nears colder temperatures that will push many indoors, Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, an infectious disease expert at Stanford, said that the next few months would be critical, but that the combination of increased vaccinations and natural immunity from infections could prevent another catastrophic wave like the one that struck last year.

“Most of us don’t think we’re going to see the terrible surge we saw last winter,” she said. “That was horrific. I hope we never have to live through something like that again.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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MONTPELIER — Acknowledging the challenge in asking an already stretched staff to expand COVID-19 testing in schools, Secretary of Education Dan French emphasized the need to prioritize testing in order to keep students in classrooms and safe settings.

There has been extensive media attention over the past week devoted to mixing of COVID-19 vaccines and booster injections. As expected, those individuals in test trials that received a mix of vaccine types or additional shots have shown no adverse events. The vaccines are safe and interchang…

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MONTPELIER — Students arriving at the University of Vermont for the fall semester must be vaccinated against COVID-19, even if the vaccines have not yet been given final approval by the Food and Drug Administration, officials said Friday.

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MONTPELIER — State officials celebrated hitting their desired goal of vaccinating 80 percent of eligible Vermonters with at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine last week, but they’re not giving up on their push to get shots into as many arms as possible.

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MONTPELIER — About 2,295 people are living in 1,631 hotel and motel rooms around Vermont as part of the state’s response to housing insecurity during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the number will continue to drop as changes have been made to the General Assistance Housing Program.

My name is Jordan Heiden. I’m a young Vermonter who drives a hybrid, has 17 solar panels on her roof, and joyfully embraces a fully plant-based diet. I’m also the Keep Vermont Cool campaign manager.

I had the unique privilege when I was the CEO and president of the Brattleboro Retreat from 2006-2016 of working closely with Dr. Fritz Engstrom in his role as chief medical officer. It is rare in one’s working life to have the opportunity to partner as an executive leader with an individual…

Vermont State University announced in January that it would have a digital resource library as of July 1, 2023. We were immediately met with a wave of questions, comments, and concerns. And though there was a negative sentiment, we were heartened to see our university and community unite pas…

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